


A Rational Fear

by Engineer104



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Allura (Voltron)-centric, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Character Study, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Fluff, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Major Character Injury, Sort Of, Team as Family, Whump, allurance if you squint too though, kind of
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-26
Updated: 2018-02-26
Packaged: 2019-03-24 06:49:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,786
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13805748
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Engineer104/pseuds/Engineer104
Summary: Alteans aren't as fragile as humans, but they aren't invincible.Or, Allura's injuries demand a stint in a healing pod; her reluctance can be easily explained.





	A Rational Fear

**Author's Note:**

> Based on a headcanon i had a while ago ~~has it been done before~~
> 
> Tagged as 'canon divergence' because i don't even know where this would fit in with the canon timeline

The fragility of the Paladins both impressed and disappointed Allura at first: impressed, because despite the weakness of their bodies, they proved themselves worthy of the Lions, and disappointed, because how could they withstand the tolls of battle outside the cockpit?

But as much as her heart hurt when she saw them in pain, she couldn’t help writhing in impatience during their recovery time, time that could be spent planning and training and answering distress signals together. And perhaps it was selfish of her, to expect so much, to pace the length of the med bay, torn between concern, guilt, and _haste_ , but the universe already pushed them hard. Any pressure she added to them couldn’t even _begin_  to compare.

And the healing pods sped along the process.

“What do you mean you don’t have anything like them on Earth?” Allura demanded of Pidge during Lance’s first stint in one. “How else do your people quickly heal from their injuries?”

Pidge glanced up from her inspection of the pod and adjusted her glasses. “They don’t heal quickly,” she told Allura, frowning. “They heal…at a normal biological pace.” She shrugged. “With injuries like that, Lance probably would’ve been bedridden for several weeks on Earth.”

“How long is a week?” Allura asked her, though she suspected she knew the answer.

Pidge glanced up at the ceiling, thinking. “Um…about five or six quintants, maybe?”

Allura stared at her, incredulous. “How do you cope with such a lengthy recovery time?”

“You get bored,” Pidge admitted, “and usually we’re not in the middle of a war, Princess.” She sat on the steps in front of the occupied healing pod, folding her arms and resting them on her knees.

Allura stood in front of her, arms crossed. “I keep forgetting how primitive your planet is,” she said.

Pidge narrowed her eyes at her. “At least we’re not ex—” She cut herself off with a grimace and instead said, “We’ll get there eventually.”

Foot tapping, Allura turned her face towards Lance’s healing pod, frowning. Coran had explained that he - and presumably all the rest of the Paladins - healed at a slightly more rapid pace than an Altean would, perhaps because their skeleton and muscles weren’t as sturdily built, although…

Although their susceptibility to injury didn’t bode well for the universe.

* * *

Allura tightened her grip on her bayard, even as she leaned back to stare up at the gray sky. Her head pounded, vision blurring despite blinking to steady it, and she struggled to breathe.

The base had collapsed around her, rigged to detonate while the occupying Galra forces evacuated, and a large steel beam fell across her chest.

(She’d heard several ribs crack, the sound shocking her almost more than the ensuing pain.)

She spotted no sign of enemy or ally, no figure silhouetted by smoke approaching the wreckage and could only hope that Hunk evaded the collapse safely.

Allura shifted in place, groaning when the motion resettled the beam over her. She tried to slide her hands underneath it, but from her position, even when she planted her feet on the ground, she didn’t have the traction to lift it.

A hiss escaped her lips when the beam moved. “Q-quiznak,” she gasped. She couldn’t even put a hand to her chest, as if that would stop the pain from spiking along her nerves.

“Allura!” a voice came from nearby. “Are you okay?”

“Yes,” she lied, turning her head in both directions in an effort to find the speaker, but when she lay back down, she finally spotted Hunk standing over her. “I thought you’d escaped in the Yellow Lion.”

“You fell behind,” Hunk told her. “I came back to find you.” He clasped his hands together, frowning uncertainly at the beam trapping her.

“Are the prisoners—” Allura cut herself off, at another stab in her chest.

Hunk immediately caught her meaning and reassured her, “Yeah, everyone else escaped safely.”

Allura sighed, relieved despite her injuries. “Good,” she said.

Hunk narrowed his eyes at the beam and squatted beside her. “Yellow and I are going to lift this thing off you,” he said, holding and squeezing her hand.

“Please do,” Allura said. She returned the pressure, hoping he couldn’t see how much pain she was in, but from the worried frown he shot her and the speed at which he retreated to his Lion, she doubted she’d convinced him.

Her heart pounded in her chest during her brief - yet still too long - wait, beating a rhythm along with her overburdened nerves. She reached up to wipe the dampness from her face, the unwanted tears, and grimaced.

The ground shuddered beneath her as the Yellow Lion landed, and she gasped in shock when it lifted the beam off her body and flung it aside as if it weighed as little as one of the plumes of smoke that lingered in the aftermath of the explosion. She slowly sat up, an arm wrapped around her abdomen and feeling at the damage to her armor, and by the time Hunk returned she was halfway to her feet.

“I’ll help,” Hunk said, offering her a hand and resting an arm around her shoulders.

“I…” Allura bit back the immediate denial and instead said, “I would be grateful.”

Hunk blinked at her, and she wondered if he was surprised by her acceptance. But he smiled reassuringly at her as she took his hand, planting one foot on the ground after the other, half-leaning on Hunk once she stood upright.

With Hunk guiding her, Allura limped to the Yellow Lion, every step sending a new jolt of agony up her spine. But eventually the pain in her chest faded to a dull ache, as if she grew desensitized to it.

“Thank you for coming back for me, Hunk,” Allura said once he’d helped her settle in the back of the cockpit.

Hunk frowned and admitted, “I would’ve come back for you sooner, but I had to fly them up to the Castle.”

“I know,” she told him with a smile that must’ve looked more like a grimace. “I would’ve called you sooner if you weren’t so burdened.”

Hunk’s frown only deepened, but he said, “Well, at least it’s only a short flight from here to a healing pod, right?”

Allura’s eyes widened. “I…what?” she said.

He blinked at her, already halfway to his seat. “You look pretty banged up, Princess,” he observed. “You’ve probably got some fractured ribs, at least, right?”

“M-my skeleton is stronger than yours,” Allura said, the response falling from her lips without much thought behind it. In fact, her father doubtless would’ve scolded her for her tactlessness.

“Maybe,” Hunk said doubtfully. He sat in his seat, hands on the controls as the Yellow Lion launched into the air and through the planet’s atmosphere, scattering smoke as it rose.

Allura used the travel time - mostly silent, except for Hunk’s quiet conversation with his Lion - to feel along her chest and abdomen, wincing every time her fingertips grazed a bruise or a break. She bit her lip, heart sinking with dread as she recognized the truth in Hunk’s words:

Accept a long recovery time they couldn’t afford, or submit to a stint in a healing pod.

Neither option appealed to her, but the thought of a long sleep over which she had little control made her stomach turn. It hadn’t been so long ago since she’d fallen out of a pod, expecting to see her father’s face only to spot a stranger’s.

Her thoughts absorbed her so much that she barely noticed when the Yellow Lion touched down in its hangar, only jerking out of the muddled mess of her mind when Coran’s false chipper voice sounded in her helmet’s speakers.

“Princess?” he said. “Are you with Number Two?”

Allura cleared her throat, pinching her eyes shut as she composed herself, and said, “Yes, I am. We’ve just landed aboard the Castle.”

“Good,” said Coran. “Will you be ready to debrief?”

“I—”

“She needs a pod, Coran,” Hunk interrupted. He approached her, resting a hand on her shoulder and asking, “Do you need my help to stand?”

“I don’t need a pod,” Allura told Coran and Hunk. “The pods would much better serve any injured prisoners we’ve freed.”

“Princess—”

Allura cut him off, “All I need is some rest, of course, and I hope to be as healthy as usual after a decent sleep and some food.”

Hunk stared at her. “But—” When Allura glared at him, he quieted…and glared, but before he could argue with her, Coran spoke up again.

“Princess, what happened on the surface?”

Allura said, “Nothing you need concern yourself about, Coran. I will be fine.”

“If you use a healing pod,” Hunk grumbled under his breath, likely low enough that he hoped she wouldn’t hear him.

Allura pretended she didn’t, instead slowly standing with a hand pressed to the wall for balance.

* * *

Allura sunk into her bed, but the soft, cool sheets did little to dull the throbbing in her chest and abdomen. She grimaced, resting a hand on her stomach, but mustered a smile when all four mice climbed onto the bed with her.

“Hello, my friends,” she told them as Plachu nestled into her hair, his nose pressing a tiny damp spot onto her neck. “I don’t suppose you have any speedy remedies for me.”

Platt’s ear twitched as he appraised her, and Chulatt and Chuchule both managed to look reproachful. She frowned at them, sensing their concern and a silent reprimand.

(Even the Blue Lion growled, fretful, in the back of her mind.)

Allura sighed, closing her eyes and trying to settle in for sleep. Rest would do her good, would give her body the opportunity to repair itself; there was nothing else to be done for it.

But pain and worry - the mice’s, the Blue Lion’s, her own - kept her mind occupied and awake. The ache pulsed at the same rate as her heartbeat, and she shamefully remembered she’d prioritized her own comfort over greeting the healthiest of the prisoners.

“Coran saw to their needs,” she spoke aloud, to the mice as well as to herself. “He and Hunk contacted their families, and Lance and Shiro spoke to them, and…” Allura narrowed her eyes at the ceiling. “Pidge would’ve asked them of her father’s whereabouts.”

She tried to roll onto her side, but decided against it when her injuries inhibited her. Hissing, she sat up and swung her feet out of bed. She looked at the mice, raising an eyebrow at them as she sensed their disapproval. “Where’s Platt?” she asked them when she only counted three.

A soft knock sounded from her bedroom door before they could tell her. Allura sighed and called out, “Who is it?”

“Princess?” Coran said from outside.

Allura scowled at the door. “Platt,” she muttered.

“Ah, yes, he’s sitting on my shoulder now,” Coran said.

“Come in,” she said.

The door slid open, the hall’s blue lights spilling in and around Coran’s silhouette. He walked in, sitting at the foot of her bed without invitation. “Princess, are you in pain?”

“No,” Allura lied. When Coran raised a skeptical eyebrow at her, she frowned and said, “I will heal.”

“One of our guests just emerged from a healing pod,” Coran informed her.

“I’m sure there’s another that can put it to use,” Allura retorted, knowing exactly what he implied.

Coran frowned at her and said, “Your father would want you to take care of yourself.”

“My _father_  forced me into a cryopod, Coran!” Allura snapped, startling the mice into squeaking. “What makes you think I want to go into one ever again?”

Coran stood and crossed his arms, and as he appraised her from his greater height…Allura suddenly felt very small, the echoes of many a childhood scolding reverberating through her mind.

“Coran—”

“Princess,” Coran said, tone firm and level, “you _need_  healing. You may not be as fragile as the other Paladins, but those pods have a _purpose_.”

“I can’t go back, Coran,” Allura said, horrified to hear her voice shaking. Her heart pounded, for once independently of her pain, but the image of herself locked in a healing pod with no concept of the passage of time crept over her.

It had always sat somewhere, a fear taken root deep within in her but only now beginning to sprout.

“What if-what if when I wake up, another ten thousand years have passed?” Allura asked through the heat pricking at her eyes. She swallowed around the unexpected, terrified lump in her throat and avoided Coran’s gaze. “What if, when I come back out, my _new_  family is dead and Zarkon has the Black Lion and—”

Coran sat beside her and rested a hand on her shoulder, startling her silent. “Allura,” he said, and the rare address from him made her glance up, eyes wide. “I will be awake, waiting for you to rejoin us when you come out.”

Allura met his eyes, steady and warm. Something in them soothed her heart, and she said, “Promise?”

Coran smiled. “I promise, Princess.”

Allura offered her own shaky smile, and though it didn’t stop the tears from streaming down her cheeks, she found herself nodding.

***

The reality of facing an open healing pod was far different than the theory of it, and Allura stumbled backwards into Coran as her heart pounded wildly. “I changed my mind,” she announced.

Coran rested his hands on her shoulders. “Princess, you _need_  a sleep in a healing pod,” he said.

“I-I know,” Allura stuttered, “but I _can’t_.” She shook, blinking fresh tears from her eyes. Her breath escaped her in gasps as she remembered her father’s apologetic and *fearful* face, the last thing she saw before he knocked her unconscious.

And then—

Allura grabbed Coran’s wrist, tightly enough that he winced. “I need to talk to Lance.”

Coran frowned at her, but then he said, “Very well. I’ll go see if he’s awake.”

“I’ll come—”

“You’ll sit,” Coran said, stern as he helped her sit on the steps in front of the only unoccupied pod.

Allura scowled at him, but conceded that it had been difficult enough hobbling down to the med bay from her bedroom.

When he left her alone, her mind turned to the healing pod behind her. She felt its presence like that of a restless spirit, like the emptiness of space, like…her father’s AI come back _wrong_  again. Her skin crawled, and as she glanced over her shoulder, she half-expected it to stand, door widening like jaws and prepared to swallow her in a cloud of white mist.

The floor chilled her through her thin dressing gown, and Allura shivered, breath coming too quick and shallow. She tore her gaze from the healing pod, just in time to see Lance enter the med bay, looking around until his eyes fell on her.

He smiled, raising a hand in a wave. “Evening, Princess,” he said, his voice just a bit too loud and echoing around the med bay. “Coran said you needed me?”

Allura narrowed her eyes at him, surprised at his lack of overflowing confidence. Instead, he looked watchful and curious, brow furrowed…worriedly.

“Did he wake you?” Allura asked after clearing her throat, noting his robe and the blue slippers.

“Nah,” Lance said, waving a dismissive hand as he sat on the steps beside her, though he kept some distance between them. “I was staying up with Pidge.”

“Doing what?” Allura wondered.

“Playing a game,” he replied with a shrug. “She’s a little disappointed that—wait, I’m here for *you*.” He squinted at her. “Why did you need to talk to me?”

Allura hugged herself and frowned at the floor. “You caught me when I fell from the cryopod,” she told him.

Lance blinked at her with a slight flush in his cheeks. “Uh…yeah.”

She met his eyes, trapping him. “Would you do it again?” She held her breath, waiting for an answer, and released it when he said:

“In a heartbeat.”

Allura sighed and rested a hand against her damaged ribs. “I don’t want to go back in,” she said, “but I need to.”

Lance glanced from her to the healing pod waiting for her. “Why not?”

“Last time I was in one, I didn’t come back out for ten thousand years, Lance.”

“Oh,” he said, his ensuing smile uncomfortable as he rubbed the back of his neck. “I knew that.”

“I’m sure,” Allura said, lips pressing together. She was always torn between amusement and exasperation with Lance, never quite certain what to make of him.

“Hey, maybe if it is another ten thousand years in there,” Lance said, “you’ll come out to see the war’s been won.”

Allura glared at him. “Or I’ll come out to see everything I know gone, _again_.”

“Or that,” Lance agreed. He slid closer to her, and after a brief hesitation rested a hand on her shoulder. “You probably already heard all this from Hunk and Coran, but we need you at full health.”

“I know—”

“And I don’t just mean the universe, Princess,” Lance said, flashing her a smile. “I mean we need you, so we wouldn’t leave you inside a healing pod. And, well, I can’t pretend to know what was going through your dad’s head when he did that, but…” He squeezed her shoulder, and Allura stared at him expectantly. “I do know what’s going through my head, and we’ll want you back no matter what happens while you’re healing.”

Allura rubbed her face, mulling over his words. “What if something _does_  happen when I’m in the pod?” she asked, voice quiet.

“Then we’ll do the best we can until you come back out,” Lance said. When she looked over at him again, he shrugged and added, “What else is there to do? You’d do the same if any of us was stuck in a pod.”

“That’s…true,” Allura agreed.

It wasn’t just Lance’s words that rang with truth, but Coran’s and Hunk’s as well. But a part of Allura still resented the necessity, resented her fragility and her *fear*. If she went in…she couldn’t shake the idea that she would never see the Paladins - _her_  Paladins - again.

“What do you need?” Lance asked, interrupting her thoughts.

“What do you mean?” She quirked an eyebrow at him, confused.

“I mean, what can I do to make you less afraid?”

Allura considered, thumb resting on her chin, then admitted, “I think you’ve done all you can, Lance.” When his face fell, she quickly said, “You’ve done plenty already.”

“If you say so,” he said, though he continued to look doubtful.

Allura looked from him to the pod standing behind her. Through her mind’s eye it seemed a black hole, or a gateway to another reality from which she could not escape - doubtless, if Slav was aboard the Castle he would give her the exact probability she would emerge from the healing pod ten thousand years later.

(It might as well be another reality.)

She inhaled, bracing herself, ignoring the pain as her lungs filled with air, and stood, using Lance’s shoulder to balance. He stood with her, hand on her elbow, and she let him help her up the stairs and to the open pod.

“Are you ready?” he said.

Allura gazed into a void, heart pounding, wounds _throbbing_ , mind buzzing.

“You’re not weak just because you’re hurt, Allura,” Lance told her softly.

Allura shook her head. “But I don’t think I’m strong enough for this.”

“You are,” said Lance. “I know you are. And maybe…if you close your eyes before it puts you to sleep, it will help.”

Trembling despite the hand still on her arm, Allura put one foot inside the pod. “I choose to believe you,” she said.

“I hope you do,” he replied.

Her other foot followed her in, and Lance let go of her and stepped away as the door descended. Her heart threatened to burst from her chest, and the sweat beading on her forehead chilled her more than she thought the pod itself would.

“I’ll be here when you wake up,” Lance reassured her, smiling, “and so will Coran, and Hunk, and Pidge, and Sh—”

Allura pinched her eyes shut when the sealed door finally cut his voice off. Her breathing came shallowly, and she saw her father reach for her again. With her limbs growing heavy, she opened her mouth, but before she could shout for him the cold and the dark pulled her under.

* * *

Her eyes shot open, but all she could see was gray. A hiss of air reached her ears, and a sense of relief that wasn’t her own filled her mind.

Cold touched her skin, and as she steadily became more aware of her own body, she struggled to lift a single heavy arm up to her face to shield herself from a sudden bright light.

Allura stumbled out of the pod, groggy and exhausted as if she’d never slept. But the only sensation in her body was the weight of her limbs, the ache in her abdomen gone as if it never was.

She adjusted to the light of the med bay, blinking furiously until she focused on a few faces, a wide, _relieved_  smile stretching her own face when she recognized all of them. She sobbed and reached up to wipe away a tear, but happily threw herself at them.

Allura snaked an arm around Pidge’s back, and the other around Coran’s. She buried her face in Shiro’s shoulder, and leaned into Hunk when he embraced her from behind. And when they all withdrew, she pulled Lance in, wrapped both arms firmly around him while he hugged her. All of their bodies were warm, so much warmer than the inside of the healing pod, but Lance’s felt the warmest.

“Thank you,” she told him, and to everyone else she repeated, “Thank you.” She pulled away from Lance, looking around at them. “H-how long was in asleep?”

Pidge and Hunk exchanged a glance, and Pidge said, “Only a few vargas.”

“Only…a few…vargas.” Allura laughed disbelievingly, pressing a hand to her forehead. “That’s all?”

“That’s all,” Coran said cheerfully.

“You kept your promise,” said Allura.

“I did.”

“I…thank you.” She glanced back at the healing pod, now standing open and ready for maintenance. She sagged, exhaling a painless sigh of relief, and turned back to her team - her new family.

Allura smiled, then admitted, “There is no reality where I ever want to do that again.”

They all laughed, and each took a turn hugging her again and welcoming her back.

**Author's Note:**

> ~~is it obvious that this is my first attempt at anything remotely whump-y~~
> 
>  
> 
> anyone else excited about season five??


End file.
